Gator Pam

Rabbit Rabbit! Rabbit!!

Baruch Dayem ha’Emetz Blessed Be the True Judge

I then started a Passover adapted version of Joanna’s Sausage Kraut in the crockpot for tonight’s dinner. I forgot to show the apple and dried cranberries in the photo above, so I took this shot before combining. Well, at this point I’m being limited on uploads, so I guess to be continued later…

Last Saturday night was the start of the eight day festival of Passover. Saturday night I went to the local CHABAD for first night Seder, but I made second night Seder for the three of us and have been doing a lot of cooking ever since. Besides the ritual foods, the meal Saturday night started with a hard boiled egg (in salt water for me), followed by jarred gefilte fish with ground prepared white horseradish. Next up was chicken matzah ball soup made with the poultry bone broth I make in the Instant Pot. The main entrée was a 17 pound turkey I received from a food drive last fall and kept in the freezer. That’s a lot of turkey for the three of us; I usually do a 12 to 14 pound bird instead. But it’s what I was given, so I used it. Here it is after a three day dry brine. For Thanksgiving I usually do Alton Brown’s Good Eats whole roast turkey, but for Passover I like to change it up a little. I went ahead and butchered the bird into the leaping frog style, which barely fit on my three quarter sheet pan, and followed Alton Brown’s method for spatchcocked chicken for roasting. Here’s the bird right after I butchered it. The leaping frog style is much easier than spatchcocking, and you don’t lose the back bone. I made a garlic and herb compound butter I rubbed under the skin, brushed the skin with extra light olive oil (I decided next year I’ll also rub the skin with some lemon juice before applying the oil), and seasoned with fresh cracked black pepper, sweet paprika, granulated garlic, onion powder, and dill weed. Since I had dried brined the bird, I didn’t add any additional salt. Being Passover I couldn’t really use any premade rubs, due to potential ingredients which could be kitniyot, so basic seasoning it was. Roast for half an hour at 425 to start getting the skin crispy… …and then roast at 360 until a probe thermometer registers 161 degrees. Those pop up thermometers don’t pop up until the breast meat is a good 185 degrees, at which point for our taste it is bone dry. The turkey was sliced and served with homemade garlic mashed potatoes, homemade giblet gravy made via Chef Alex Guarnaschelli’s recipe which uses roasted onion and garlic that’s puréed to thicken rather than any type of starch so it’s perfect for Passover, honey and maple glazed with dill weed carrots, and the Sefardi charoses I made for the ritual portion as a replacement for cranberry sauce as it is made with dried fruit, including dried cranberries. Dessert that night was a noodle kugel that I made with kosher for Passover gluten free wide egg noodles and crumbled coconut macaroons in place of graham crackers for the topping. I was too busy preparing Seder on Sunday to stop for lunch, so I didn’t start doing any Pesadik (Passover) lunches until the first day Chol Hamoed (intermittent day) on Monday. That was a quick and easy childhood favorite: a gefilte fish sandwich on matzah: It consists of butter spread on matzah, a sprinkle of kosher salt, TempTee cream cheese, Passover prepared ground white horseradish, and sliced gefilte fish. Not the prettiest dish, being white on white on white. But it’s tasty! Monday night I went to see Jon wand The Band Geeks in downtown Seattle. I made the decision to get naked chicken wings and adopt a “don't ask, don’t tell” attitude towards what type of oil they were cooked in. Tuesday I made my grandma’s recipe for matzah meal rolls, and then used some of the turkey from second night Seder to make a sandwich. Since commercial mayonnaise tends to be made with soy oil and mustard, two items disallowed on Passover according to the tradition I follow, I made a cup of homemade mayonnaise and used that. The sandwich consisted of the matzah meal roll, mayonnaise, Sefardi charoses from Seder, turkey, and some warmed gravy from Seder. Tuesday night I think I just did a matzah board with butter and cream cheese for dinner. Lunch was pretty filling. I did make a cauliflower tabbouleh-style salad to refrigerate overnight to serve for dinner on Wednesday. Wednesday’s lunch was almost a repeat of Monday’s, although since I had the matzah meal rolls I made the gefilte fish sandwich on that instead of on matzah. I spent the day Wednesday making more sweets to see us through the rest of the holiday. Yerushalayim Chocolate, supposedly a Kosher for Passover version of Dubai Chocolate. I wasn’t happy with how they came out, but I have some changes in mind to implement for next year. Chocolate Dipped Coconut Macaroons And Matzah Caramel Crunch Wednesday’s dinner was the rest of the matzah ball soup and the cauliflower tabbouleh made the day before. Thursday’s lunch was more of the cauliflower tabbouleh. Dinner last night was a turkey tetrazzini made with kosher for Passover gluten free fine egg noodles and diced carrots, as peas are considered kitniyot and are not allowed for Passover. No photo, but it came out pretty good. Today I started off by packing up the 10 cups of turkey left for the freezer. I usually package in two cup measure, but we had so much I went ahead and did three and a quarter cup measure for future casseroles. To be continued…

Can anyone use some Torrid Cash? I received $350 in Torrid Cash I have no plans on spending. It has to be used by this Monday.

I’m trying something new in my raised beds this year. I was gifted a two year old artichoke transplant by one of the former food bank garden coordinators at Marymoor Community Garden in appreciation of my help last year with watering some of the food bank beds. I always thought our garden here on the Eastside of Seattle was considered 8b. But apparently the garden has its own microclimate of zones 6b - 7b. I’m hopeful putting the artichoke out now isn’t too early for it. I’m waiting for the garden’s delivery of compost to put a nice layer on top of my beds. I’ll then install my ollas, transplant my tomatoes, and cover everything with dried leaf mulch. Then it will be fertilize, weed, and wait for harvest. The artichoke as I received it. Measuring out the planting hole. Confirming the depth and width of the planting hole before fluffing out the roots. The artichoke in its new home. I hope it will be happy and thrive there.

Rabbit Rabbit! Rabbit!!

I had my most recent annual physical in mid December. At that time, my weight has been the highest it has been since before I started keto, my blood pressure was slightly high, and my a1c test for my type II diabetes came back over 7 again, which it has done every three months for the past two years, even with the diabetic and high blood pressure medication I am on. A couple of weeks later, around New Years, I started seeing the ads for the “natural Ozempic,” as one tends to see weight loss ads at the start of the year. I mostly ignored them, but my curiosity finally convinced me to watch one, which said there was a simple three ingredient recipe that could be easily made and taken daily to help weight loss and blood sugar. So, I watched it. Of course it was for a pill that was being sold, but I decided to do some searching and see if there was anything that could made at home. I had heard of the anti inflammatory benefits of ground turmeric in the past, so I looked to see if there was anything that could be made at home that could at least help. I found some articles which claimed the combination of ground turmeric, ground ginger, and black or cayenne pepper has been studied and found to be beneficial in some participants. I decided to add each to my two cups of coffee each morning. I started off with a quarter teaspoon of ground turmeric and an eighth of a teaspoon each of ground ginger and fresh cracked black peppercorn into each cup of coffee. This is in addition to the half a teaspoon of Ceylon cinnamon I have put into each cup of coffee for the past decade or so. The combination is reminiscent of chai in my coffee, but it’s not totally unpleasant. I made no other changes to anything in my daily routine. At the end of January I had a follow up hematologist appointment, and was surprised to see my weight was down five pounds since my physical the month before. I seriously expected it to be up a few pounds, as had been the trend for the past year or so, as well as having just gone through the holiday season. The next week at the start of February I increased the amount of ground turmeric, ground ginger, and ground black pepper, basically doubling each, so I was now having a teaspoon of ground turmeric, and a half a teaspoon each of ground ginger and fresh cracked black peppercorn daily in my coffee, as well as the teaspoon of Ceylon cinnamon. Again, I changed nothing else in my daily routine. Today I had a three month diabetic follow up at my primary care physician. My weight is down another seven pounds since I saw my hematologist at the end of January, my blood pressure was 113/75, and my a1c was 6.7, the first time I’ve been under 7 in a couple of years. I know, it’s very gradual and possibly very circumstantial, so I’m probably being silly to be hopeful about this. I need to stop the turmeric, ginger, and pepper for the next couple of weeks, as even western medicine admits that turmeric is a blood thinner and I have a procedure coming up the first week of April. But, trust me. Once the procedure is finished, I’m going to be adding them back in for as long as they seem to benefit me.

Eight different varieties of tomatoes, two in each pellet and two pellets of each variety. My two raised beds have room for 16 plants total, so I hope to get two strong plants of each variety to transplant in eight to ten weeks. If I wind up with more, I’ll offer them to friends or at a seed and plant swap. This is still all experimentation for me. Last year I started seeds I saved from the previous years San Marzano-style tomatoes, which were planted with other varieties in the same bed. The plants grew and produced, but I think they were smaller overall than the Roma tomatoes I had saved seed from, so they may have cross pollinated with the other varieties I grew. I’m growing two plants from Roma seeds I saved last year from the smaller tomatoes. We’ll see how they produce this year.

We have germination! I just got this set up yesterday, and even as compact as it is, it’s precariously balanced where I had room for it. Hopefully I can find a board the perfect width and length to give it stability.

The Luck o’ the Irish Americans to Ye! Sliced corned beef. I used a flat cut, rather than a point cut, even though I prefer the extra fat of the point cut. But the past few years the point cuts have shredded rather than sliced nicely. However, I also added an extra step of resting the brisket for half an hour after the 12 hour cook in the crockpot. It definitely firmed up the meat a little; in fact the taste was a little too dense for my liking. Not dry, but dense. I think I’ll try the same method next year, but I’ll go back to the point cut and see if the extra step works. Carrot, parsnip (was supposed to be turnip, but another member of the household picked up the ingredients and apparently misheard me), onion, potato, and cabbage Fresh out of the oven Irish Soda Bread The top buttered and sprinkled with cinnamon sugar. Removed from the Pullman loaf pan and cooling before slicing. An interior view of the soda bread. I used dried cranberries instead of raisins or currents. I reconstituted the dried cranberries by simmering in whiskey for 20 minutes and allowing them to cook before stirring into the dough. I find mixed straight into the dough they remain too chewy for me. This was perfect. My dinner plate.

I’m a third year raised bed gardener at Marymoor Community Garden in Redmond, WA. Zone 8b. I was a complete novice when I started three years ago in a single bed, and moved to a pair of raised beds with an arched trellis in between them last year. I still feel like a novice at this point, but I love sharing what I’m doing and getting advice from others. Today is indoor tomato seed sowing day. If they germinate and up pot well, they should be ready for hardening off in mid May and then transplanted out to my raised beds in late May/early June, depending on our temperature at the time. Here is my garden set up. I had agricultural fleece over my beds for the winter, as I overwintered garlic, asparagus, and a purple collard tree in the beds. I pulled the agricultural fleece back last week and removed the dried leaf mulch I had put over the beds to protect the soil over the winter. It looks like some settling occurred over the winter months, so I plan on adding some compost to bring level up before planting more. I hand raked in some lime as well as organic vegetable and tomato granular fertilizer, and noticed my red wrigglers appear to be getting active. I quartered up a butternut squash and pushed it lightly into the soil as food for the worms, but something kept digging the squash quarters out, although they didn’t seem to eat anything from them. I finally used a spade and dug deeper into the soil, completely burying the squash quarters. I figure the red wrigglers will find them deeper down. So far, whatever was disturbing them before hasn’t bothered them since burying them deeper. I grew eight varieties last year and saved seeds from all eight. This is my chart of how I sowed them in my seed starting tray. This is a 36 coco coir pellet starting tray. My intent is to transplant two of each variety into my raised beds. I put two seeds from a variety into each pellet, and did two pellets per variety. If I have 100% germination, I’ll have double the plants I need, but I know germination rates tend to be much lower than that, especially with self saved seeds. As I only needed 16 pellets, I removed the others in a pattern I found easy to chart and have stored them to be used next year. Not to mention, the San Marzano style seeds were saved from tomatoes that were grown from seeds I saved the year before. So these are second generation seeds. Since they were not isolated from other varieties when I grew them two years ago, they seemed to grow smaller than the crop I had the previous year. But they were plentiful and tasty. They also weren’t isolated last year, and won’t be this year, so I’ll see what I wind up with. If too far from the original, I won’t save those seeds this year, and start fresh next growing season. The seeds sown and covered over with a light layer of coco coir. The humidity dome on top until germination. This is going to sound out of the ordinary, but I’m germinating my seeds in my bathtub. I don’t have any place to set up a heat mat, and I have found the warmest place in the house to be in the enclosed bathroom with no window. So, until germination the seed tray will sit on the floor of the bathtub. The shower curtain will be drawn closed, and the bathroom door will be kept closed. I figure the occasional light from the bathroom being used won’t disturb the germination process too much. We’ll see what happens in a week or so.

Et tu, Brute?

Oh. My. Stars… My absolute favorite concert experience was attending seeing The Philip Glass Ensemble play the scores of The Qatsi Trilogy live while the films were shown overhead over the course of three nights. This was in either the late ‘90s or early aughts in Gainesville, FL. I never thought I would have the opportunity again, but apparently The Philip Glass Ensemble (most likely without Glass on keyboards, due to his age, whereas he was on keyboards when I attended the three shows) is touring Koyaanisqatsi at least, playing the score live along with the film. Of course I’m going to attend! If the tour comes to your area, I highly recommend trying to go. It’s a breath taking experience. https://seattlesymphony-prd-cd.flexaccelerator.com/en/concerttickets/calendar/2024-2025/25-philip-glass

Ouch. Is he OK? Did the deer run off? Or do y’all have venison to look forward to? Tonight starts the festival of Purim, with Shushan Purim following on Shabbes. It’s not in my tradition to bake cookies for the winter festivities, but I do make hamentaschen for Purim. This year I kept the count of each kind between a half a dozen for each of fruit filled, and closer to a dozen for the specialty ones. So we have: 6 fig 6 apricot 6 prune 7 espresso martini and 10 s’mores That’s still nearly three dozen for the three of us. That will definitely see us through the festival, and then some! Since each kind of the traditional fillings made about a dozen, I have enough to deliver them to some friends as well. Hopefully it will make their Purim, or at least their weekend, merry.

Ooo… I’m removing my overwinter layer of leaf mulch, and look what revealed itself underneath! It’s white because it had been covered by mulch, but I suspect it will turn green as it grows and is exposed to light.

Rabbit Rabbit! Rabbit!!

Our low last night on the Eastside of Seattle was 37, but we’re predicted to hit 62 for a high today. Predictions say we’ll have highs in the low 60s throughout the weekend, but return to highs in the low 50s next week. That’s a long run for us for False Spring. It will be interesting to see what is predicted for later in March. I’m itching to start working the soil in my raised beds.

Here on the Eastside of Seattle we can drop into the teens, but we typically average overnight lows in the high 20s and they only last a week or so. The food seems to weather the cold OK, as far as I know.

I have a friend who is planning to move across the country at the end of next month. She has a lot of canned goods she’s not planning on taking with her. I saw a photo the other day the free pantry at one of the churches in Kirkland showing it could use some donations. I also went through some of my shelved food stuffs I wasn’t using, packed them up and picked up some goods from my friend. I then made my first donation at the pantry. Here’s hoping I did it right. I’ll probably make a stop once a week until my friend’s back stock is diminished. The outside of the pantry at Holy Spirit. What I found when I first opened it. And a few non food items on the bottom. After I added the items I brought. I hope some of these items will fill needy bellies. A lot of these foods need a can opener. Not that I can afford it, but if I could find a deal on bulk inexpensive manual can openers, like at least 100 but no more than $20 for them, I might order some to donate along with the canned goods.

I just returned from the Galentines Day bake off competition where I entered the Meyer Lemon Cheesecake with Blueberries that had the lumpy batter. Long story short, I didn’t win my category, even though I had a 50/50 chance as there were only two entries. Read the captions on the photos for details, including what the head judge told me as to why I didn’t win. As a reminder, here’s the practice cheesecake I made last week. This is the entry cheesecake immediately after decorating it. I tried a different method of piping the lemon curd which worked even less well, so I won’t do that method again. However, I think increasing the size of the heart definitely helped to define its shape better than the smaller one. Because the piping was so terrible, I decided to dress up the sides by adding miniature candy hearts to the sides. I think it definitely looks pretty… FullSizeRender.MOV Here’s how I displayed the cheesecake at the competition. We had to display our cakes by 12:30 PM with the winners scheduled to be announced at 3:00 PM. I used the lid of the inexpensive Dollar Tree cake carrier to hold ice so the cheesecake could sit out without being refrigerated. My only competition in the cake category. Obviously a carrot cake by someone much better at decorating than I am. This carrot cake won my category. It definitely looks luscious! What the head judge told me “off the record” after the competition ended was that the flavor and texture of the cheesecake itself was spot on. There was no evidence of the lumpy batter (yay!). If I had left it at that, I would have edged out the carrot cake to win. However, while the judges appreciated the color and look of the candy hearts on the sides of the cheesecake, they said the candies did not soften at all and that the crunch detracted from the smoothness of the rest of the bite. For that choice, they awarded it to the carrot cake. I had fun preparing, entertaining, and attending this event, though. I appreciate everyone’s input on the flavor choice and decoratingg ideas. I think I’ll definitely enter again if it’s held again next year!

I decided to do the Meyer Lemon Cheesecake with Blueberries for the bake-off. I’m very glad I did a practice run; several of my experiments did not work out. Fresh out of the Instant Pot and topped with sweetened sour cream and zest. The first lesson learned was to not use parchment paper around the sides. I thought it would help the sides look smooth rather than blurry, but the sides actually came out pocked as I pulled the parchment away. Removed from the push pan and plated for the three day rest. After “aging” for three days and ready to be decorated. I’m really terrible at decorating. This was taken immediately after decorating. Lessons learned here is to use a narrower tip to pipe the lemon curd, define the shape of the heart more with the whole blueberries flooding with the pie filling, and to not use the candies Meyer lemons at all. Their texture does not compliment the cheesecake at all. The decorated cheesecake after being refrigerated for a couple of hours. I think I’ll also make the heart in the middle a touch larger, to emphasize the shape more. One last top view before slicing. An interior view and three slices. I tried to a blueberry pie filling swirl, but the filling all sank to the bottom and made the crust a bit soggy. I saw a technique where one takes half the batter and flavors it, fill the pan with alternating scoops of the batters, and then swirl it together. I was concerned that method would turn the entire cheesecake purple, but it has to work better than what I did. Now to decide if I want to experiment doing it that way on my entry cheesecake, or leave out the swirl completely. A close up of a slice. Lessons learned from this practice run: If trying to swirl, use the half and half method and hope for the best since I don’t have the funds to do a second practice run. Do not use parchment around the sides of the push pan for a cleaner edge. Enlarge the heart in the center. Do not use candied lemon slices for decorating.

Eek! I’m a day late!!!